Arthur Kenyon stood with his back against the trunk of a beech, his revolver drawn and about him such a motley crowd that only a comic opera could have reproduced it. Gypsies chiefly, the fire-light flashed upon sallow faces which a man might see in an evil dream; upon arms that a mediæval age should have forged; upon limbs that forest labor had trained to hardiness. Crying together in not unmusical exclamations, the raiders appeared in no way desirous of injuring their man, but only of disarming him. One of their number lay prone already, hugging a wounded thigh and muttering imprecations which should have brought the heavens upon his head--a second had the Englishman by the legs and would not be beaten off; while of the rest, the foremost aimed heavy blows at the extended pistol and demanded its delivery in sonorous German. Such was the scene which the picture presented to Gavin as he awoke. He was on his feet before the full meaning of it could be comprehended. "Halt!" he cried, for lack of any other word to serve. His tone, his manner, drew all eyes toward him. "What do you want?" he continued, with the same air of authority. Twenty voices answered him, but he could make nothing of their reply. He was about to speak for the third time when rough hands pinioned his arms and feet from behind and instantly deprived him of the power to move a step from the place where he stood. "To conduct your excellency to the Castle of Okna--we have come for that, excellency." "You are aware that I am an Englishman?" The gypsy pointed smilingly to his wounded friend. "We are perfectly aware of it, excellency." "Then you know the consequences of that which you are doing?" "Pardon, excellency--there are no consequences in the mountains. Let your friend be wise and put up his pistol. We shall shoot him if he does not." Gavin, doubting the nature of the situation no longer, shrugged his shoulders and invited Kenyon by a gesture to put up his pistol. "We can do nothing, Arthur, let them have their way." "I beg your pardon, Gavin; I could make holes in two or three of them." "It would not help us. They are evidently only agents. Let's hear what the principal has to say." "Very well, if you think so. It's poor fun, though--almost like shooting sheep in the Highlands. But, of course, I bow to wisdom." He held out his hands to the gypsy who bound them immediately with a leather thong taken from the saddle-bow of the excellent pony he had ridden. Silently and methodically now, the men secured their prisoners and produced their gyves of heavy rope. To resist would have been just that madness which Gavin named it--and but for Evelyn the scene had been one to jest at. "Do you treat all your guests at the Castle of Okna in this way?" he asked the leader of the men suddenly. The reply was delivered with a suavity delightful to hear. "When they come to us with soldiers and Turks, then we speak plainly to them, excellency."